


A Favor Between Friends

by riotcow



Series: It Started With a Favor Between Friends [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Breathplay, Demisexual Sherlock, First Time, John's not gay really, John's pretty toppy, M/M, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Seduction, Sexual Experimentation, Sherlock's pretty bottomy, Virgin Sherlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-17
Updated: 2014-06-17
Packaged: 2018-02-05 00:37:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1799065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/riotcow/pseuds/riotcow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John jerked abruptly, knocking the remains of his brandy over onto his book and then quickly trying to rectify the matter with anxious motions. It was a markedly unusual reaction for a man with his nerves of steel. “Sherlock! What are you talking about?”</p><p>Sherlock tilted his head. "Sexual attraction," he responded, as if it were obvious.</p><p> </p><p>  <em>Smut. Some breathplay.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	A Favor Between Friends

**Author's Note:**

> A post-Reichenbach AU that ignores Mary.

“There’s something I’d like to try.”

Dr. John Watson rattled his newspaper lightly, turning down a corner to regard his flatmate over its edge. Sherlock had been laying in his dressing gown on the couch for over an hour, still as a statue, staring at the ceiling.

“What’s that, Sherlock?” John felt himself go slightly on guard, as it was always possible that Sherlock’s ideas were illegal, questionably ethical, or wildly dangerous. Sometimes - well, often - all three.

Sherlock didn’t respond, which wasn’t unusual for him, except that, well, something about it _was_ unusual. John lowered the newspaper further and studied Sherlock across the room. He had the strangest feeling that Sherlock was actually, perhaps, a bit uncomfortable.

Okay, now he was curious.

“You said there’s something you want to try?” he prompted, taking a sip of the brandy by his chair.

“You know that I’ve never understood the allure of sexual activity, don’t you?”

At that, John sputtered a bit, setting his glass down with a startled _clink_. He paused a moment, collecting himself. “Well. We’ve never directly spoken of it, have we? But, yes, I imagined something of the sort.”

“There’s a rumor at the Yard that I’m still a virgin.”

John cleared his throat slightly. “I’ve heard it.”

“It’s true, you know.”

John found himself getting nervous in quite a new way. He was used to being on edge as Sherlock outlined his latest scheme, until he’d fully assessed the likelihood that it would end in one of the two of them being maimed or arrested. But this was different.

John found himself choosing his words with extra care. “Well, again, I didn’t presume to be sure. But yes, it had occurred to me that it might be.”

Where was this going? Sherlock had started with wanting to _try_ something. Did he want to try something -- _no_. Not even Sherlock would be that… clueless.

“I’ve recently become concerned that my lack of experience in this realm may be... limiting my capacities with regards to the _work_ after all,” Sherlock said thoughtfully.

John had the brief impulse to fold the newspaper and set it aside, but then he realized that it provided a sort of barrier that he wasn’t ready to give up at this exact moment, so he aborted the plan. He let his eyes return to the words in front of him, though now every bit of his attention was focused on Sherlock’s still form in the corner of his eye.

“How so?” he asked from behind his makeshift shield.

“I would have solved the Butterberry case more quickly if I hadn’t had to wait for _you_ to remind me that lust alone could have accounted for the Duke’s profoundly irrational behavior.”

“Possibly.”

“Possibly in time to save the chauffeur’s life.”

Now John finally lowered his paper. “No. Sherlock. I don’t think so.”

“You’re saying that because you don’t want me to feel bad. I don’t feel bad. I’m merely telling you what I’ve concluded, based on what I’ve observed about myself over time.”

John sighed in exasperation. How very... _Sherlock_. “You know that I’m not the kind to offer a comforting lie,” John said.

“Yes, you are.”

He rolled his eyes and went back to the paper, deliberately ignoring his flatmate. Sherlock for his part seemed to suddenly realize that he had veered into insulting John, which was possibly not the ideal strategy for getting whatever it was he wanted.

“I’m sorry, John, I didn’t mean it,” he said perfunctorily, clearly lying. “And yet, my point stands. I’ve decided that it’s time to rectify my deficit in this area.”

Well. There it was. Okay.

“Well, I understand that there are lovely and discreet professionals who can help with that sort of thing.” John tried this out hopefully, trying not to sound as uncomfortable as Sherlock had a moment ago. It occurred to him that Sherlock was genuinely out of his depth here and could probably use some actual guidance with whatever it was he was considering.

Sherlock leapt suddenly to his feet with a sound of exasperation and paced over to the window, throwing John a disgusted look. “No, no, John, you know that will not do. I could never trust a stranger with this. I don’t have any way to know how I’m going to react. What if it makes me just as feeble and addle-brained as it does you people? I could be completely vulnerable.”

At that, John finally gave up the battle, neatly folding his newspaper and setting it aside. He took another, heftier swig of his brandy before proceeding.

“No, you see, Sherlock, you’re missing the point,” he attempted to explain. “If, uh, you’re actually trying to understand -- well, _sex_ , you do realize that you have to let it make you at least a little bit vulnerable, don’t you? I mean, that _is_ kind of the point of the thing.”

Sherlock stilled again at John’s words, though now John could make out more of his expression, as the amber glow of the streetlight below underlit the severe planes of his face through the window. Come to think of it, Sherlock looked strangely… vulnerable. John pushed the pang aside.

“I haven’t missed the point, John.” Sherlock’s words were soft and precise. “I understand that perfectly well. That’s why it needs to be someone I trust.”

John was starting to find himself intrigued quite in spite of himself. Where was the lunatic going with this, anyway? Who did he _trust_ enough…

“Sherlock,” he said abruptly, in a disapproving tone. “I don’t know what you’re thinking, but Molly obviously has real feelings for you. You can’t be considering --”

“ _Molly?_ ” Sherlock said her name with genuine surprise. “I could never do such a thing with Molly. You must realize that.”

“Oh.” John blushed slightly. “Well, what other woman do you trust?”

Sherlock made a noise of amusement, turning slightly to regard John with a wry look. “Why, none, John Watson. There isn’t a single woman that I trust enough for something like this.”

Why was John’s stomach knotting at the look that Sherlock was giving him? Why was his throat suddenly tight?

“Well. Okay. Then -- how?”

Sherlock laughed openly at that, and John’s blush suddenly deepened. He noticed that his empty tumbler was shaking slightly in his hand, and once again he found himself setting it down overly hard on the side table.

“Come now, John, I’m supposed to be the obtuse one when it comes to these matters. Surely you know that there is only one person on this earth into whose hands I could possibly put myself? Only one person on this earth who I could... _trust_ , if I were vulnerable.” Sherlock looked at John closely. “The one person whom I have trusted already, and who has never let me down, no matter the deed I asked of him.”

“Sherlock --” John’s voice was no longer completely steady.

“Now listen, this is important. You know that I wouldn’t ask otherwise.” That was another blatant lie, but whatever.

“Sherlock --” Louder this time.

His obstinate flatmate barrelled on. “After all, if I had just made the connection a day sooner, even eighteen hours --”

“Sherlock.” John snapped loudly. “Listen to me.”

Sherlock finally shut his mouth, regarding John quizzically.

The doctor for his part rubbed his hand over his face for a moment, looking pained.  “Sherlock,” he began, in a more reasonable tone now. “It’s bad enough that Mrs. Hudson, half of the Yard, and no small proportion of the population of London believes that we’re sleeping together, no matter what I say about it. You do realize, don’t you, that I am, in fact, _heterosexual_?”

Sherlock looked unconcerned. “Of course you are.”

John sat back, looking resigned. “That means that I don’t generally -- do the sort of thing that we’re talking about, with blokes.”

Sherlock made a sound of annoyance. “Yes, John. I do have the usual amount of technical knowledge regarding such affairs. I understand what heterosexual means.”

John sat silent for a moment, staring. “But you’re… propositioning me. Right. Aren’t you?” He was still holding on to the hope that this was all some bizarre misunderstanding, and that Sherlock had some other plan than the one that John was discerning.

“I was thinking of it more as asking a trusted friend for an important favor.”

John looked taken aback. “Sherlock… the sort of thing we’re talking about… it’s not the sort of thing that people generally do as a… _favor_. Especially not with friends who are, you know, not of the proper gender.”

“Why not?”

John blinked. “What?”

Sherlock suddenly withdrew from the window, settling into his own chair opposite the doctor. He leaned forward, expression intent. “I said, why can’t you do this for me, as a favor? We do quite a lot of favors for each other, don’t we? I understand that this is a part of friendship.”

“But not sex! Especially not between men. Uh. Straight men.” John was actually finding himself at a bit of a loss to explain this adequately to Sherlock.

“Again… why not?”

John pinched the bridge of his nose. “Because, Sherlock, I don’t know how to say this, but because you are a bloke, I wouldn’t really be… _able_ … to help you with this. Right?”

“Of course you could.” Sherlock stared at him.

John spluttered again. “No, Sherlock, I really couldn’t. Are you really not getting this? I know that the whole point of this conversation is that you don’t quite understand these things, but I don’t know how to be any more direct about it.”

“John, I told you, I understand full well that you’re heterosexual. But I don’t understand why you keep asserting this as a reason why you cannot help me, as we’re both aware that you’re sufficiently attracted to me in particular that you would probably enjoy yourself.”

At that, John jerked abruptly, knocking the remains of his brandy over onto his book and then quickly trying to rectify the matter with anxious motions. It was an unusually clumsy moment for a man with his steady hands. “ _Sherlock!_ What are you talking about?”

Sherlock tilted his head. “Sexual attraction,” he responded, as if it were obvious.

By this point, John could no longer ignore the fact that his heart had at some point begun hammering in his chest, his pulse elevated, and that if he knew, that meant that Sherlock knew it too.

“No, no, Sherlock, I don’t know where --”

But Sherlock cut him off. “Elevated pulse is only the most obvious sign,” he stated, as if he were reading his John’s mind. John _hated_ that bullshit sometimes. “Whenever we wind up in close proximity, your pupils dilate, the back of your neck flushes slightly, and you experience a level of tumescence that, while relatively mild, I assume is not beneath even your meager notice.”

John sprang out of his chair and paced into the kitchen, running his fingers through his short-cropped hair. “Sherlock… whenever you and I wind up in close proximity, it’s usually because we’re in the middle of some sort of life-or-death situation. Of _course_ I’m physiologically aroused… you would be too, if you weren’t a bloody psychopath!”

Sherlock seemed to be observing John’s pacing with significant interest. “Sociopath,” he correctly absently. “I’m sorry, John, I didn’t realize that you were in such denial about it. I thought you knew. I would have been more tactful about it -- well, I could have tried.”

“ _Sherlock_. Listen to me. You’re _mistaken_.”

Sherlock arched an eyebrow. “Seriously? Have you ever once seen me be ‘mistaken’ about something this obvious?”

That actually brought John up short, and he found himself looking around the flat as if there might be someone else to help him.

Sherlock’s tone softened, the way that he very occasionally used with fragile clients but never had with his friend before. “John, I don’t understand what you’re so upset about. Surely you realize that I reciprocate your feelings, inasmuch as I understand such things or seem to be capable of them.”

“What?! No. Sherlock, I don’t actually think you’re gay either --”

“Of course I’m not,” Sherlock interrupted. “I don’t believe it would be accurate to describe me as having any conventional sexual orientation, do you? I was asexual before asexual was cool. I said that I reciprocate your attraction, but I’ve never felt such a thing before. I have been surprised to discover that I’m capable of it, but clearly only once I’ve decided that someone is trustworthy.” Sherlock paused a moment, his eyes locked on John’s.

John swallowed. “But Sherlock --”

“I never met anyone I considered trustworthy until I met you, John. So apparently I’m not asexual after all, but I only experience sexual attraction in the context of a strong emotional bond.”

Coming from Sherlock, It was uncomfortably close to a declaration of love. John felt himself sweating now, and he began to pace about the outer perimeter of the flat, a habit he only indulged when feeling quite distraught. His head was, frankly, swimming with confusion, making it hard to think. It was not an experience he had often, not since before he’d been sharpened by his years in the service.

“Okay, look, Sherlock, we have got to get this entire exchange onto firmer ground, okay?” John paused in the middle of the carpet and began to gesture at his flatmate. “I know that you’ve applied your very formidable, very large forebrain to this little problem of yours and you’ve come up with what seems to you like a reasonable and obvious solution --”

“And you have now reiterated six times that you cannot help me with this and not yet supplied a single genuine reason. John, I’m sensing that this topic makes you uncomfortable and that you are bothered by your attraction to me, but I assure you that it’s perfectly natural. And since we both know that I’m correct, and I’ve evened the playing field by admitting that it’s not one-sided, I’m failing to understand why you’re so certain that you can’t do me a favor that, I have every reason to presume, you would enjoy.”

John was beginning to feel at a loss for how to regain control of this situation. And then, as he floundered there in his very own living room, the most bizarre thought of the so-far-very-bizarre evening occurred to him.

Was Sherlock _right?_

John had opened his mouth to continue to protest, and he froze just like that, before the first syllable managed to pass his vocal cords.

Was he actually _attracted_ to Sherlock?

The detective was watching him stand there paralyzed, and for once evinced a modicum of actual patience as he waited for John to work through whatever he was caught up in.

“Sherlock.” John’s voice definitely quivered.

“Yes, John?” He gazed at John expectantly.

John stared back in stunned horror. “Look. We just… we can’t. I’m sorry, Sherlock. I know that you don’t understand why, but I simply can’t do what you’re asking.” With this pronouncement, he trudged back to his chair and collapsed into it, dropping his head into his hands.

Sherlock cocked his head again, studying John for a long, thorough moment. John drained the last of his brandy from his tumbler and looked utterly lost.

Sherlock rose from his chair and moved past John into the kitchen, neatly snagging John’s tumbler from the table as he passed. John heard the clink of the bottle, and a moment later another couple of fingers of brandy was being pressed into his trembling hand. He rarely had this many drinks on evenings in -- he’d seen too many unexpected life-and-death situations to feel comfortable when truly pissed. But under the circumstances, he was willing to make an exception.

He knocked back the entire drink and slumped down into his chair. And then yelped when he felt Sherlock’s fingers thread lightly through the fine hairs at the nape of his neck.

“Shh, just relax, John,” come Sherlock’s soft voice from behind him. Sherlock briefly rested his hands on John’s shoulders to discourage him from trying to rise, but John found that he didn’t have as much fight in him as he would have expected of himself. He didn’t know exactly what Sherlock was up to, but he’d made perfectly clear what was on his mind, hadn’t he? And yet John found himself relaxing as Sherlock began to run his fingers over John’s scalp.

Sherlock’s voice was low, hypnotic. “I _know_ that you’re not gay, John,” he reassured the doctor. “Your attraction to me wasn’t there initially, when we met. I’ve observed it manifesting in your body slowly, over time. And you’re right, I would not be gay either, if I were like the rest of you. This isn’t about what box you check on the intake form at your therapist’s office, John.”

He massaged the back of John’s neatly shaven neck, the sturdy, strong muscles of his upper back and shoulders though his light jumper, Sherlock's hand moving carefully around the healed wound on John's left side. Sherlock trailed cool, nimble fingers over the side of John’s throat, and John’s head slowly slumped forward as he listened to Sherlock talk. It was a past-time that he spent many hours engaged in every week, which had just become suddenly, disturbingly intimate.

“This attraction has grown from the dozens of times that you and I have faced down death at one another’s sides,” Sherlock continued explaining softly as he continued to work over John’s tense muscles with expert care. “It has grown from the countless hours that we have spent following the workings of one another’s minds. This is not the physical attraction that gay men have toward one another, John. No, this attraction is merely one facet of the urgency that you and I feel toward one another all the time, the drive to walk toward danger together, to share those dangers with another, so that there is someone else to witness, to _feel_ how very alive the danger makes us.”

John felt Sherlock’s fingers pause briefly above the pulse point of his carotid and knew that Sherlock was gauging just how aroused John was becoming. He also felt certain beyond a shadow of a doubt that Sherlock had noticed the half-hard bulge in his jeans.

 _So just what was the point of resisting this, anyway?_  he wondered with a mix of resignation and excitement.

“What did you want to try?” John heard himself ask, his voice calm. Sherlock let his nails graze lightly across John’s skin. John shuddered, hard.

Sherlock only hesitated a second. “I want to suck you off, John. On my knees in front of you, in this very chair. It’s the first sexual fantasy I ever had about you. Or at all, incidentally. That was six and a half months ago, if you’re curious, and I’d like to finally find out what it actually feels like.”

John felt a wave of light-headedness as he absorbed what Sherlock had said. The mad, brilliant, famous Sherlock Holmes had never had a sexual fantasy in his life until he met _him_ , unassuming doctor with a grim military past, John Watson.

And now Sherlock wanted to be on his knees in front of him. Was bloody well _asking_ for it.

John groaned, which Sherlock seemed to interpret as some kind of an answer. The taller man leaned forward over the back of John’s chair, his hands skimming lightly down John’s torso to the lower hem of his jumper. Sherlock grasped and tugged and John cooperated and suddenly John was bare-chested, the extensive scarring on his shoulder fully exposed in the firelight. Sherlock resumed massaging John’s shoulders, again avoiding any untoward interest in the wound. John knew he must be interested -- his eyes had lit up on the rare occasions when John wandered the flat with it uncovered -- but he seemed to correctly intuit that it would have made John even jumpier than he already was.

“After that,” Sherlock continued, “I’d like you to bring me to orgasm as well, but with no previous data I can’t reliably predict how my body will react, so I’m not sure how much guidance I will be able to give you. That’s another reason that I wished to entrust myself to you for this instead of a woman. You may have a better idea of what to expect from me than I do, John.”

Sherlock paused, and John was again visited by a ghostly sense that Sherlock was nervous in spite of his confident patter. Then he continued, in a softer voice: “I was actually hoping that you might do me the favor of being willing to be in charge of that portion of the proceedings.”

John’s eyes widened. Sherlock wanted him to… _top_ him, basically, if he understood the terminology correctly?

Sherlock’s hands slowed, then stilled, then a few fingertips trailed down John’s bare arm as Sherlock slowly made his way around John’s chair to stand before him. John forced himself to look up, and Sherlock was staring down at him just as intently, his pale eyes at their most terrifyingly lucid.

Those eyes roamed over John’s torso openly, of course flickering over his scars, and John did indeed feel the flush that Sherlock had mentioned rise up on the back of his neck. Sherlock actually looked… _hungry_. Lustful. It was an expression that John had only ever seen on Sherlock's face previously when the topic at hand had been cocaine or heroin.

Sherlock sank gracefully to his knees between John’s feet. The doctor had sprawled considerably as Sherlock massaged his shoulders, and his legs were spread wide, giving Sherlock plenty of space.

“You even wear denim like a soldier, do you know that?” Sherlock told him from his new place, splaying his long fingers over John’s tense thighs. “It’s the first thing that I noticed, with this new _wanting_ tangled up in it. That you always look like you’re home on deployment and wearing civilian clothes for the day, no matter how long you’ve been out of the service or how relaxed you are. You think of yourself as a mild-mannered doctor, and you don’t even know that you walk through the world always looking capable of immediate violence.” Sherlock’s eyes shined in the low light of the flat as he gazed up at John. “It’s the hottest thing I’ve ever seen, that combination.”

John’s breathing was fast and light, and the bulge in his jeans was no longer half-hearted. The hard line of his formidable erection was clearly visible against his thigh.

Sherlock broke eye contact for just a moment to pointedly glance at John’s hard-on, and when he looked back his smile could only be described as impish. “Would you still like to deny your interest in this activity, John?”

John felt his fingers grip hard on the arms of his chair. “If you don’t want to give me a chance to change my mind, Sherlock, then you ought to shut that smart fucking mouth of yours and find a better use to put it to immediately.”

John was stunned to hear the roughness of his voice and the sharpness of his words, but Sherlock just smirked at him triumphantly and ran his hands up to the fly of John’s jeans, letting his touch graze _just_ beside the prize that he was seeking. John growled, and Sherlock glanced up at his face and, clearly affected by whatever he saw there, began the task of freeing John’s erection with sudden impatience.

In only a handful of seconds, he felt his cock spring free from the tight confines of his jeans. Sherlock was gazing at him in undisguised fascination, and showed no shyness in reaching out and grasping his erection.

John bucked, instantly, in the chair, with a loud gasp. He felt a few drops of precome begin to ooze onto Sherlock’s questing fingers.

“Christ,” John snapped, grabbing his head in his hands as he concentrated on keeping himself together for a moment. Sherlock was obviously pleased with the effect he was having, and he was nudging his way forward and leaning in, attentively breathing in the warmth and scent of John’s body.

“I hope it’s not an important part of the fantasy that this part lasts a long time,” John ground out, slowly relaxing again as he regained his confidence that he wasn’t about to orgasm immediately.

What the hell had happened to his evening anyway?

Suddenly he felt wet warmth. Sherlock’s mouth, brushing the underside of his cock. Sherlock’s tongue, broad and soft, tracing his length slowly. John’s head lolled all the way back and he melted into the chair beneath Sherlock’s ministrations.

Sherlock paused. “Talk to me, John. What’s happening? I’m relying on you to tell me if there’s anything that I need to do differently.”

John made a strangled noise, then took a moment to collect himself. “Your technique… is rather expert,” he said in a thick voice. “If you’ve never done anything like this…?”

Sherlock laughed softly, his breath ghosting against the sensitive skin of John’s groin. “Well, I did do some research. I found that it was important to me to try to plan for it to be a good experience for you, so I viewed and read some pornography. It was quite ghastly, but instructive.”

With that, Sherlock finally closed his mouth fully around the glans of John’s swollen cock, making sure that his lips were slick enough with saliva to allow him to swallow him down further. John bucked again, and Sherlock moved his hands from John’s thighs to his hips, pressing down, holding him in place.

The restraint was exciting, and John fought off another alarming wave of nearly-coming. He closed his eyes, screwed them shut, and had a sudden, brief flashback to the only time he’d ever felt a man’s mouth on him before. They’d been through months of deprivation, dull terror, and frequent slaughter, and they’d had reason to believe that many of them were going to die in the next few days’ maneuvers. The boy who’d come on to him had been desperate for one final moment of pleasure before the end of his brief life, and while it hadn’t been a particularly sexy experience for John, it had at least given him a moment of oblivion from the horror that his brain had been by the point in the war.

John had survived. John always survived. The boy hadn’t.

The memory sobered him, and he found himself settling back into the chair, closing his eyes, and letting Sherlock have his way.

Whatever pornography Sherlock had been watching was obviously well-produced, as he experimented his way through a variety of techniques and seemed to take great delight in noting John’s reactions to each. Maybe it was this open delight that made John feel less self-conscious about his various moans and jerks than he’d ever felt when a woman was going down on him. Or maybe it was that Sherlock was another man, and an admitted virgin at that, though you wouldn’t know it from the aptitude that he was currently displaying.

And he was _Sherlock_.

John was rock hard in Sherlock’s mouth, and the younger man was now relaxing the back of his throat and managing to swallow almost all of John’s cock in spite of how immensely swollen he was. His success was admirable, and yet John felt Sherlock’s throat convulse slightly for a moment, felt Sherlock breathe his way through his gag reflex without slowing his pace.

It felt _incredible_.

John made himself glance down, and saw that Sherlock was now sweating lightly, his eyes closed in concentration. On sudden impulse John reached down and grabbed Sherlock by a handful of his dark curls, sharply yanking Sherlock’s head away from his cock. Those icy blue eyes snapped open and they locked gazes for just a moment before John leaned forward, sliding his free hand downward over the front of Sherlock’s loosely-tied robe directly to…

 _Yes_. Sherlock gasped loudly, his lips parting, as John found and squeezed his erection with a demanding hand. The gasp evolved into a moan, and Sherlock actually, for once, reacted like a normal human being, his head tilting back toward the fist tight in his hair, exposing his throat, thrusting his hips forward jerkily into John’s hand.

Watching this intensely sexual, intensely hot reaction coming from the ice cold Sherlock Holmes undid John completely. He twisted his free hand in the front of Sherlock’s robe and pushed himself forward out of the chair. Their mouths crashed together in a searing kiss as John took Sherlock down onto his back on the carpet, covering that long, agile body with his own, leveraging his slight advantage in strength. 

Not that Sherlock was fighting him. Surprisingly he seemed to have good instincts and he yielded easily, letting John take the upper hand, opening his mouth beneath John’s demands and cooperating fully with John’s urgent need to get his robe open and out of their way. Sherlock tasted exactly as John would have expected -- hot, hotter than any mouth that John had ever kissed, with the faint bite of nicotine on his tongue. They assailed one another with determined hands and mouths, and after a brief interlude that was going to leave a number of florid bruises on hips and backs, John flipped Sherlock onto his stomach. He pressed a knee between Sherlock’s thighs to part them, and found himself seeking some new and pressing sense of _somewhere important_ inside of Sherlock’s trembling body.

 _Slow down, boy_ , he reminded himself, feeling Sherlock tense beneath him. He had to remind himself that even though Sherlock seemed like he knew what he was doing, he was basically faking it. _You may be half-mad and confused with lust, but you’re still handling a virgin. You can be some kind of a gentleman._ Fingers first.

“John --” Sherlock’s voice was raspy.

John slid a hand between them and let his fingers search for the warmest, darkest reaches of Sherlock’s body. It felt good to know what he was doing… Sherlock might be a man, but John was a doctor who had never been shy in bed with his various girlfriends, and this part shouldn’t be all that different, technically speaking. Sherlock moaned loudly, arching and twisting as John’s fingers slid into him. He half-tried getting his knees up under him, but John was having none of it, pressing him back down flat on his stomach.

“Relax, Sherlock.” He made himself say his friend’s name, acknowledging the reality of this moment no matter how strange or terrifyingly unexpected it was, refusing to get through this by dissociating. He’d had enough of that shit since the war and then Sherlock’s death.

“ _John_.” Now there was a definite shake in Sherlock’s voice; he sounded afraid, in a way that John had never heard any of the many times that they’d faced imminent death together.

John slowed his fingers but didn’t withdraw them, instead finding Sherlock’s prostate and stroking its firmness. This gradually relaxed the younger man, and then John fitted their bodies together and thrust his hips against Sherlock’s, feeling both of them shudder with the promise in that act.

“I don’t -- I thought --” Sherlock’s voice was tight. “John, I’m sorry, I thought I could do this if this was what you wanted --”

But Sherlock was pushing back against John even as he apologized. John knew exactly how a woman moved beneath him when she wanted him inside of her, and it was exactly like this.

“Shh,” John interrupted, rocking them together steadily there on the carpet, fingers still massaging Sherlock from the inside. “It’s your first time; everyone gets scared at this point. But Sherlock, you asked me for this because you knew you could trust me.” John withdrew his fingers, brought his hand to his mouth, and borrowed a generous measure of saliva to ease further penetration. “So _trust me_ ,” he urged, sliding his fingers deeper this time, spreading them slightly to stretch Sherlock just a little, just enough to make him ready, and Sherlock hitched beneath him.

“ _Damn_ it,” Sherlock hissed softly, his limbs flailing about with uncharacteristic clumsiness. He continued to try to push himself up, but John knew that he didn’t really want _up_ , what he wanted was to push their bodies closer together even if he didn’t understand his own impulses. John just pressed down all the harder in response, nearly pinning Sherlock now, and felt Sherlock softening, melting.

So that was what he needed. Fine. Good, even. John understood that well enough.

He shifted his weight, freeing his other hand, and reached up, gathering Sherlock’s slender wrists together and holding them in an iron grip. Sherlock was stretched like the strings on his violin bow between John’s two strong hands, the left one pinning his wrists, the fingers of the right thrusting into his body. John felt Sherlock’s body thrumming beneath him, thrumming with confused, overwhelmed need.

“ _John_.” The word broke between his string of moans and hitches. “God. You have to stop. No, wait, don’t stop. Oh god, John, I didn’t know it would feel like this --”

Sherlock Holmes was _begging_. John felt an incredible rush, more than sexual. He’d always enjoyed getting the upper hand, but being of gentlemanly character, he’d been careful all his life to keep an eye on it when he took women to his bed. He’d never have been quite this rough with a girl, but he had no real fear of hurting Sherlock, who had asked explicitly for John to take the lead tonight and who was certainly responding nicely to John’s indelicate manhandling so far.

John nuzzled into the hollow at the side of Sherlock’s throat, which was damp with perspiration. “It’s okay, Sherlock, this is exactly how it’s supposed to feel, I promise. Like you’re coming apart, isn’t it? I promise that means we’re doing it exactly right. Just let me show you…”

“I don’t know how -- it’s too much, I don’t know how not to fight this… help me…”

 _Help me._ Sherlock Holmes, begging for his help. _Christ_. John nearly creamed in his unzipped jeans.

“I _am_ helping you…” he coached in a hoarse voice. “You feel how I’m holding you down, Sherlock? _That’s_ what you relax into. Relax into my grip, understand? Let me hold you. And _trust me_ … I’ve taken care of you before, I can take care of you now...”

Sherlock turned his head to the side so that John could see him in profile. He was panting, and John could see that his eyes were wild now.

“I do trust you,” he whispered. “I do, that’s why this had to be you. It _had_ to be you, John.”

The doctor caught his breath. And here he’d thought that Sherlock was missing the point of all this, about this moment of vulnerability. He was wrong. Sherlock had understood just what he was getting himself into after all, and that was why he’d insisted that it be John.

He trusted no one else in the world.

John’s erection throbbed painfully against the zipper of his jeans. He slid his fingers free of Sherlock’s body, wiped a fresh, generous measure of spit onto them, and reached for himself instead. He rucked his jeans down just enough to get a good grip on himself, spreading his saliva around, and started to nudge himself into place.

“Oh god.” Sherlock was starting to sound nervous again as he realized that it wasn’t John’s fingers pushing into him now. “John, are you sure?”

He didn’t answer, just shoving Sherlock’s knees a little further apart with his own in a satisfyingly aggressive gesture. He ran his hand up Sherlock’s long, perfectly formed spine and into his hair, tugging. Sherlock groaned low and arched, bringing their bodies into perfect alignment, and John began to press into him slowly.

Sherlock gasped loudly. “Wait!”

John grit his teeth and managed to pause, the head of his cock now enveloped in the hot pressure of Sherlock’s body. He gave them both a moment to adjust before easing his way forward, simultaneously rocking their bodies together and gripping Sherlock with bruising force at one hip and the opposite shoulder. The onslaught of competing sensations would help keep Sherlock from over-focusing on the intensity of the penetration. Better to make it all the way home, then let him come back to that part of the experience, once it would be more pleasurable.

John’s strategy seemed to work -- Sherlock rocked with him, clearly using the motion to help soothe himself through it, making small sounds under his breath. John took his time, brow furrowed in concentration, and at the end he gave his hips a little jerk to make sure that he was buried all the way. He then leaned forward and dropped his head to rest between Sherlock’s shoulder blades, and let their bodies come to a moment of stillness, their bare torsos in full contact.

 _I’m fucking Sherlock Holmes_ , he forced himself to think. To accept. To marvel at.

Sherlock finally stopped trembling beneath him, and he turned his head to the side again so that John could see his distinctive profile. His lids were heavy, his lips parted, and John was shocked to see that Sherlock Holmes was capable of such lush sensuality.

“I’d say that you’re definitely no longer a virgin, Sherlock,” John murmured in the deep silence of the flat, kissing Sherlock’s shoulder. He had no idea when Sherlock had turned off the lamp -- they’d been in a lit room when the conversation began, but now they were mostly in shadow, to John’s relief. Probably easier this way. “How does it feel?”

When Sherlock spoke, his voice was low, raspy. “I didn’t realize how challenging the sensation would be. I understood it might be painful, and I’m largely indifferent to minor pains. But it’s not exactly that. It simply feels like _too much_.”

John’s fingers wandered up Sherlock’s back, over his shoulder, tracing the beautiful, sculpted nape of his neck. “Don’t worry, that’s just the first thrust. When I move again is when it starts getting good for you. I’ve found your prostate. You’re going to do just fine.”

Sherlock’s eyelids fluttered. “It’s making me… feel. A lot. Of feelings that are entirely new to me.”

John felt himself smile against Sherlock’s ear. “I should hope so.” He gave an experimental thrust of his hips, and they both gasped in unison. John pressed his hand over Sherlock’s on the floor, their splayed fingers interlacing against the carpet.

John found himself setting up an easy rhythm and Sherlock began to rise to meet him. Their hips began to snap together with some force, but Sherlock was definitely still making small sounds of appreciation in the back of his throat.

John slipped one arm around Sherlock’s neck, bracing his forearm along the throbbing carotid on Sherlock’s throat. “Have you ever masturbated?” he asked as coherently as he could.

John was glad to see that it took Sherlock a moment to focus enough to answer the question. “Yes, once, to make sure that I understood the mechanics of the act. Orgasm was pleasurable, though didn’t seem to present any compelling reason why I ought to experience it again.”

John huffed in amused exasperation. “Good enough. I want you to come up on your knees a bit, Sherlock, just enough to take hold of yourself. You understand?”

To John’s satisfaction, Sherlock simply complied without complaint or criticism. John began to think that he might be able to pull this off after all.

John kept Sherlock’s shoulders pinned flat to the ground, John’s left forearm braced on the ground beneath Sherlock’s throat, and both of them were on their knees as John began to drive himself into Sherlock with some determination.

“Stroke yourself, Sherlock. Good, like that, I can feel you doing it. Long, firm strokes, in time with me. Now I want you to do something for me, will you, mate?” John paused, screwing up his nerve. “I want you to focus on how it feels, now that you’re doing it with someone inside of you. Not the same at all, is it?”

Sherlock groaned in obvious response to his words, and John felt a surge of triumph that he was reading Sherlock so successfully. “You understand, now, what I meant about needing to be vulnerable to do this,” he told his friend. “Now, Sherlock, you and I are going to work together. You with me?”

Sherlock’s hips bucked harder at being given a goal. He was ready.

John lifted his arm up against Sherlock’s windpipe. “I’m going to fuck you until you come, and I’m also going to choke you until you _just_ pass out. Our job is to make sure that these two events coincide as closely as possible in time. You following, Sherlock? Because you’re such a smart boy, I’m requiring graduate-level sex from you on your first time out of the gate. You up for this?”

It was never a tone that he would have taken with a woman, not even one who was eager to get dirty on an early date. But with Sherlock, it came easily, because it wasn’t even really acting a role, was it? This was just… them. Sherlock, luring John into fucking him with some bullshit pseudo-reasoning about being a better detective. John, letting himself take such a ludicrous tale at face value if it would allow him the coming moment of ecstasy. Of, let’s face it, _fulfillment_.

“I understand, John. I can do this.” Sherlock’s tone was uncharacteristically meek, not a single note of defiance. He sounded almost -- shocking as it was -- eager to please. John felt pleased with himself. He’d finally found a domain where he truly had the upper hand on Sherlock Holmes, and so far he was playing his cards _perfectly_.

“Let’s see.” John threw down the gauntlet, and began simultaneously to increase the force with which he was fucking Sherlock and to press his forearm across Sherlock’s throat enough to slightly restrict his airway. Sherlock rose to the challenge, began to stroke himself with obvious intent and to broadcast the information that would help them coordinate the two different goals on the table… Sherlock’s orgasm, and his unconsciousness.

It didn’t take long.

Sherlock performed perfectly, giving away every sign of his approaching orgasm so that John could increase the restriction across his airway. John knew that it was working, and thought, as often as they’d had to think as one man to survive some of the situations they encountered together, maybe it should be no surprise that they’d be as in synch in getting themselves off together.

Sherlock let himself cry out in John’s arms as he approached the edge of his first post-virginity orgasm. John wondered for one wild moment what Mrs. Hudson must be thinking. Then he felt Sherlock stiffening beneath him, and knew it was time. He tightened the angle of his elbow slightly, and cut off the small amount of air that Sherlock was still getting.

Sherlock began to come in John’s arms with a piercing yell, even as just a beat behind he went halfway limp and his voice trailed off into choked, desperate gasping. His cock throbbed quite dramatically as he spurted through his fist and onto the carpet, and John felt Sherlock’s internal muscles contract hard around his own cock even as Sherlock lost the rest of his muscle tone and went flat on the floor, bringing both men down in a tangle of limbs, one on top of the other.

Just as Sherlock stopped moving beneath him, John felt himself tip over his own edge, overwhelmed by the strangeness of everything that had happened in the last hour or so of his life. The spasms of Sherlock’s body practically milked John of his own seed, and the whole thing struck John as so supremely _filthy_ that it almost made him want to come a second time even before the first one was fully concluded.

John had always thought of sex as one of the peak experiences of the human condition, as well as an excellent stress reliever. He was also quite romantic at heart, was John Watson. But this thing that was unfolding in 221B Baker Street was clearly an anomaly, and a deeply mind-blowing anomaly at that. John had truly never once been conscious of fantasizing about this, wanting this. And yet, now that it was happening, he had the strangest sense of finally getting something that he’d been craving for a very, very long time.

John’s orgasm was glorious, yet even at the height of his ecstatic mindlessness he didn’t forget exactly what was happening. This wasn’t the usual. This was very, very far from the usual, and it was Sherlock Holmes shuddering in his arms as John spent himself with a loud, low groan.

Sherlock was still quite limp, and John held him firmly as he finished coming inside of his body, biting down on the back of Sherlock’s shoulder, in the same location where John's exit wound marred his own flesh. John didn’t know if he was keeping himself from crying out, or trying to mark his territory for the next one who came sniffing around Sherlock Holmes.

 _There better not be anyone else_ , he thought fiercely, bracing himself on his bruised and aching knees above Sherlock’s prone form.

And then there was a long moment of silence, John collapsed on top of Sherlock in the shadows, as both of their breathing slowly returning to normal. After a moment John pulled his hips back and slipped free. There was the sound of the fire crackling and that was it. John checked Sherlock’s pulse briefly; he was fine, was probably already fully conscious again.

Sherlock shifted, and John rolled so that his full weight was no longer draped across Sherlock’s bare back. Sherlock grabbed his wrist, though, ensuring that John wasn’t pulling away.

John settled again and wrapped his arms around Sherlock, finding a comfortable position for his stiff shoulder, and the younger man relaxed. “Don’t worry,” John reassured him in a husky voice, then cleared his throat a bit. “I’m not going to flee and pretend it didn’t happen.”

That earned him a tired chuckle. “I admit, the possibility that you’d opt for that outcome had occurred to me,” Sherlock muttered, one hand absently stroking John’s denim-covered thigh.

“Well, this _was_ a little out of left field for me, Sherlock. You know I really hadn’t noticed all of those things that you so helpfully pointed out.”

The side of Sherlock’s mouth turned up. “No, John, obviously I assumed that you _had_ noticed. You people never cease to amaze me with the vast reaches of your obliviousness. You can’t even tell what’s going on in your own _pants_.” He stretched, a long, languid stretch that arched from splayed fingers overhead all the way down his spine and his ridiculously long legs, and John felt another stirring. Sherlock writhed like a big cat and wound up with his head against John’s leg, peering up at him with those stunning blue eyes. “How’s your gay panic, Dr. Watson?” he asked innocently.

John huffed in amusement, and let himself run his fingers through Sherlock’s dark curls. His hair was thick, coarser than a woman’s. Sherlock pressed into John’s touch, again giving the impression of having some feline DNA. “Gay? I was just doing a favor for a friend,” John said affectionately.

“Yes, well, Mrs. Hudson is in this evening and neither of us was exactly silent. You’re never going to convince her that you’re not my doxy now, are you?”

“Thanks for that, then. ‘Doxy’?” John raised an amused eyebrow and shook his head. “So? Then? How did the experiment go, Sherlock? Have we, uh, rectified your problem, do you think?”

Sherlock blinked up at him. “It’s going to take some time to make sense of the massive influx of new sensory data.” His hand absently moved toward his flaccid cock and stroked it, leading to a subtle change in its dimension. John found his eyes following Sherlock’s hand with something like… hunger.

Realizing what he was doing, John tore his gaze away. Sherlock’s cool blue eyes were watching him with intense interest, and it was clear that Sherlock was well aware that John’s mind was already back in the gutter.

“Then…” John’s voice was slow, deliberate almost. “Does that mean that the experiment is… over? It’d be nice to know whether to expect… more of this. In the future. Either way is fine, obviously.”

Sherlock furrowed his brow and sat up. “Well, it turns out that I don’t know,” he replied equally slowly, climbing to his feet, clearly unperturbed by his nudity. “I had assumed… but as it turns out, I’m not entirely sure. I didn’t exactly plan ahead.” Sherlock shrugged back into his dressing gown with a contemplative look on his face, studying John in a new light.

John grinned and shook his head as he found his own feet and got his jeans back in order. “Well, do be sure to let me know if you figure it out, Sherlock.”


End file.
